This year marks the 114th school year for Mount Ellis Academy (MEA) in Bozeman, Mont. With enrollment up and the dorm full, students and staff began the year with adventures abounding. During the first week of school each year, the seniors take off into the Crazy Mountains for senior survival and the rest of the student body goes on outdoor school.

Stan Hudson, who has served as pastor of the Moscow (Idaho) and Pullman (Wash.) churches, will soon take on a new role, developing a North Pacific Union Conference (NPUC) Creation Resource Center. In this role, he will gather creation resources; coordinate study programs; plan field trips for pastors, teachers and students; present weekend creation seminars at Northwest churches; and visit academies and elementary schools for science presentations and weeks of prayer. Hudson is known for his creation seminars and Lifetalk Radio show Sink the Beagle.

Two churches in Hillsboro had a need. Sunset Christian Fellowship needed a pastor. Mosaic Adventist Church had a pastor but needed a permanent place to meet. For about a year, each church family had worked on achieving its goals, unaware of the other's needs. Yet each time members thought they had found the perfect solution, doors were closed on really good opportunities.

Vacation Bible School (VBS) at Transformation Life Center (TLC) in Olympia included something special this year: a fundraiser called Operation Kid-to-Kid to raise money to send New Testament Bibles to children in Thailand.

“We set an initial goal of 50 Bibles and a secondary goal of 100,” says Laurey Jones, TLC young adult member and one of the VBS leaders. “For every $4 the kids brought in, we were able to send one Bible to a kid in Thailand.”

For two years, the Beaverton Church has hosted an annual parking lot sale for the local community. On Sunday, June 14, church members and community members alike occupied spaces in the Beaverton Church parking lot and sold what they no longer needed. The Pathfinder group was also able to get in on the fun and raise money for their activities by hosting their own booth as well as making smoothies. Everyone enjoyed the beautiful day and the chance to meet neighbors and make new friends.

We like big things. Big names, big paychecks, big promises. But the little things, often overlooked, are really what matter.

A scant week before I was to leave for this summer’s General Conference Session in San Antonio, I tried place kicking the laundry room door. I did so neither on purpose nor with any semblance of accuracy. Only my little toe met the mark, and therein lay the problem.

They're leaving the church! That’s the refrain I hear, and have shared, over and over again when the subject of youth comes up (I include the 16 to 35 age group in my use of the word "youth" in this article). We cite studies by the Barna Group and tell anecdotal stories of youth who have left the church. We blame the local church, the Adventist academy or the university, or we point to the fact that they didn't go to an Adventist school. We stand in conference office hallways and opine about the millennials and just exactly how they should be kept, reclaimed or reached.